Textile finishing ranges utilize an insulated outer wall with tenter means carried within for moving the fabric or web through the heated area where air is directed against the web. Film ovens or other similar devices utilize similar enclosures with tenter frame means and the like to move a web such as film rather than fabric as described herein. The apparatus is also thought to be useful in connection with foraminous webs but its utility may lie especially in connection with fabric where there is no substantial flow through the web.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,074,841 discloses dryer apparatus having plenums or blower boxes especially designed for conveying material through a dryer by air pressure flotation. U.S. Pat. No. 3,384,980 discloses a dryer for a web material wherein the blower boxes have, as an incidental feature, a short lip extending to either side. However, the blower boxes are not arranged to face-to-face relation and do not contemplate the structure or the results achieved by the invention hereof.
Prior finishing ranges generally include a single manifold means which extends entirely across the ducts or blower boxes. It has been found even with manifold means which do not extend entirely across that uneven drying of the fabric occurs as a result of increased cross of transverse velocity of air necessitated in areas bounded on one or both sides by the manifold means.
It is an important object of this invention to reduce cross-flow interference of spent air with impinging air and since the air flow retaining baffles hereof thus eliminate an unacceptably uneven rate of heat transfer to the cloth, the cloth is heated and dries at a constant rate so that dye migration and uneven heat setting and curing is avoided. The apparatus constructed in accordance with the invention may be used for heat setting, heat curing or drying and similar processes.